A very social affair
14 Mar 2014 by Evoluted New Media
As a decade passes since the world became aware of Facebook, and Twitter continues its onslaught on the zeitgeist – all in 140 characters of course – we ask what has social media done for scientific publishing? Social networking site Facebook celebrated its 10th birthday last month – that’s right for the last ten years we’ve been encouraged to share our ‘life events’, attention seeking updates and sickeningly twee kitten photos with family and friends. It has also encouraged the creation of other social media platforms, a combination of which has completely changed the way we interact with family, friends and colleagues – even people we don’t know. For some scientists it has changed the way we do science, and how we tell everyone about it. Social media has become a place to share research – some even take to Facebook and Twitter to conduct theirs. It has connected scientists all over the world; its immediate, its reactive and a great place for debate. One way in which Twitter has changed how we share information, in a very real sense, is the hashtag #canihazpdf; a means of getting access to articles locked behind a paywall through the kindness of those with a subscription. All you have to do is tweet a link to the paper you want with the hashtag and contact details, and hope that someone is kind enough to supply you with the pdf. Given the rising cost of some journals – between 1984 and 2002, the price of scientific journals increased by 600% – this hashtag is incredibly useful, especially when many universities are reconsidering their journal requirements. In 2003 Cornell University cancelled its Elsevier journal package citing an unsustainable pricing model, prohibitive selections and the financial impact on the library’s ability to purchase other titles. Their subscription included access to 930 online and print journals, which represented mere 2% of the library’s subscriptions but a massive 20% of their expenditure. That same year, Harvard cut its Elsevier subscription, and the University of California also reviewed its requirements. In January this year, the University of Montreal cancelled their Wiley-Blackwell subscription. The University had electronic access to more than 1,000 journals but will now only subscribe to 368 – accounting for 71% of its academics’ total usage in 2012 – with inter-library loans giving access to other required journals. Publishers charge thousands of pounds for subscriptions to their journals. Their model – around since the 1660s – originally provided a way for academies to share their ideas, but it was recognised that wholesale changes needed to be made in order to take full advantage of the internet. Why, when we are instantly connected by email, text and social media was our publishing process still conforming to such an outdated model – and one that costs so much? But what is the solution? Researchers advocate an open access policy, where work funded by the public or charities should be free to read for those who fund it. Many open access – and online only – journals have sprung up in recent years, and have received the support of funding bodies like the Wellcome Trust who insist that researchers they fund publish in open access journals, or forego remaining funding. But open access can have more than just a financial impact – it can provide a podium for work to be scrutinised before wide scale publication. arXiv is a great example; it allows scientists to share preprints of their work online before it is published. In 2011, result from the OPERA experiment at Gran Sasso suggested neutrinos travelled faster than the speed of light, but researchers were cautious of publishing their rather surprising results. By opening them up to scrutiny of peers via arXiv, they discovered flaws in their equipment set-up and avoided the embarrassment of having to retract such a huge claim. So I guess we should thank Facebook; it has played a role – albeit a small one – in changing the research publishing process. In this day and age of constant and immediate communication, we realised our model of publishing research is somewhat outdated and are in the process of implementing a more open, accessible model.
